Sports
Adidas Had Big Hopes for Russia’s World Cup
Adidas’s business boomed in the country but sanctions in recent years have caused revenue there to plummet.
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In 1980, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan led dozens of countries to boycott the Summer Olympics in Moscow. An undaunted Adidas AG still sponsored the USSR’s Olympic team, becoming one of the first global brands well-known behind the Iron Curtain.
This summer’s soccer World Cup should have had the German company cashing in big on its ensuing decades of expansion in host nation Russia. But another Russian military adventure—this time in Ukraine—damps much of that opportunity.
